Confessions of a gamer

I think that 2016 was a very memorable year for gamers, especially when you look at the games that came out in Autumn. I don't think I've ever seen that many games that came out in such a short time that I wanted to buy and play. But the rest of 2016 was also pretty good, especially games that really made a difference like Overwatch and that game is still pretty popular. But which game was the best and was do all the games in 2016 say about what you can expect in 2017? This was one of the best years for gamers? I think 2016 is one of the best years for gamers because a lot of good games came out and you had a lot to pick from. Also some cool games were announced but I don't think that really counts towards this year, but 2016 doesn't need that because there are already a lot of great games in 2016! Let me start with Overwatch, I know not everyone likes this game but looking at all the people that love this game and still do to this very day I think pretty much gua...

Some people on YouTube seem to believe that only very succesful multiplayer matches or flawless single player videos are what people are interested in. So whenever a video is less succesful then some YouTubers consider that as something they can't use. I personally don't agree with that because if you only show your best moments you're not being honest to your viewers and pretty much try to look like someone you're not. So the question is... Is it content or not? I record a lot of game videos, at least I used to when my camera was still working as it should. Of course some videos would be better than others but I wouldn't just show people the videos where I would win and do well. There are also videos where I was not that good and I lost but because something happened in the video that I personally thought was interesting or funny I decided to show it anyway. Not that I want to spam YouTube with videos but I think that there should be more than just the succes...

When you're a teenager some people will already look at you as if you're weird or just an idiot when you say that you play games, because a lot of people don't understand how people consider that a hobby and waste money on something that expensive. Well the same can be said about fireworks, it's expensive and one moment you have it and the other moment it's blow away...literally! But somehow I don't hear a lot of people complain about that. So this makes me wonder, are you ever too old to play games? There is no maximum age for gamers? If you get weird looks from people when you say that you play games and you're a teenager, then you can imagine how weird those looks are when you're over thirty and you say that you play games. I personally don't see the problem but a lot of people don't take you seriously and think that you're some immature douchebag. Well that might be true but that doesn't mean that every gamer is just like the ot...

I remember my first adventures in online gaming, it was new and exciting! But now it's nothing new and what's worse is that a lot of people aren't that nice online. What happened? Did we all turn into serious and sour gamers or did something else happen? Things used to be better? Well I can't speak too much about the good old days because I haven't been playing online with other for that long. Oh not since a couple of years but more like a decade ago, so I can't say that I know how things were before that but even in 2005 and 2006 when online gaming started for me people were less serious and more fun to play with. When I think back of Guild Wars Factions on my PC and Saints Row on my Xbox 360 I can't deny that I had great times playing with strangers, sure there are some rotten apples but nothing to ruin the fun. I really loved meeting other people and making friends all over the world. One moment I would be talking with people from Eastern Europe and...

When I first heard of this game I wasn't certain about it, sure it looks cool but other games offered more in my opinion. For example Dead by daylight gives you different types of killers and the scary first person view for the survivors, to me this is a bit more intense but then I saw the Friday the 13th game beta and I knew that this game might actually be pretty good! One killer vs seven survivors is fair? You would think so but Jason is very powerful, he can grab someone and kill them instantly and what's worse for the survivors is that he can teleport! This teleportation can really be overpowered because Jason can be from one point on the map to the other in an instant. What's even worse is that Jason also has some type of chase teleport where the camera chases the survivor and if you time it right when you play as Jason you appear right in front of the survivor and can grab him or her immediately. This isn't just overpowered but also unfair because Jason can...

Why settle with traditional Christmas movie when there is a more modern version that is just as good and even funny? Scrooged is this movie where things take place in the modern world, but at the same time hold on to the key characters from the original story. Modern Christmas Carol? You can say that, but the names aren't exactly the same though. The new Scrooge is Frank Cross, a cynical tv executive that gets a visit from the ghost of his old boss that warns him that three spirits will visit him and that things will end badly for him if he doesn't change his ways. Of course Frank doesn't take this serious and thinks he's just hallucinating, but as you know from the original story things will change. What I really like about this movie is that it doesn't take things that seriously and gives a funny and modern spin to a classic tale. I wish more movies would be like that, to take old stories and put them in a modern setting without losing the strength of the st...

Most people get presents on their birthday, with Christmas and if you live in the Netherlands and the upper part of Belgium then you often get presents with Sinterklaas (on the 5th of December) as well. But what do you do with these presents? Do you cherish them till the end of your days or do they end up on some pile of stuff you never look at again? What about the gifts you get in a game? Do you care more for those or even less? It's the thought that counts? That's what I always learned from everyone that gave me a present and no that doesn't mean that I got terrible presents, but it's not all about getting the super cool expensive stuff. You should keep in mind that not everyone can afford that and the fact that someone gave you something is already more than enough. At least that's how I see it, because if you only care about what you get and this has to be quite amazing then you're in for a lot of disappointments! I got actually a lot of stuff just be...

This is one of the most frustrating things of gaming for me, when something in the game is broken and it prevents you from completing a mission or quest and also prevents you from making progress and/or getting an achievement. No matter what you do it stays broken and you're completely at the mercy of the developers fixing this problem. Is this acceptable? I don't think so! Game breaking bugs/glitches ruin a game? Yes they absolutely ruin a game, even if it's pretty small and might seem funny at first it's possible that just a small bug or glitch can mess up everything. The amount of times I got stuck on just a pixel and had to reload a previous checkpoint which sometimes means losing an hour or so of gameplay is very annoying. But more recently I played the Hearts of Stone dlc for the Witcher 3 and found out that in a side quest a diagram doesn't show up in a chest, eventhough the chest is marked red (which means that it has a quest item inside it) and the ar...

I think every YouTuber will get a moment that he or she loses the interest to make or post videos, but the reasons for that aren't always the same. It does feel good to be busy so most YouTubers will find a way through this but that might lead to moments where there is hardly any activity on the channel. As much as you might love doing what you do you can't escape... Moments where you lose interest in making and posting videos. I get these moments a lot lately, not that I hate making or posting videos but just all the crap that comes with it. For example right now my camera is just not working as it should, which means I can only record short videos and usually just one and then I have to charge my camera for an hour again to record another video. This really slows things down and leaves no room for error. So if something goes wrong I can start all over again and that includes the hour of waiting until my camera is charged again. This is something that completely destroys...

I wasn't really looking forward to play my placement matches in ranked mode in Overwatch, mostly because a lot of people complained how they got a much lower rank than before, but also because I hardly ever have a good time in ranked mode. I just do my placement matches, a total of ten, and then I'm done with it because it's a very toxic community from my experience on console. Maybe some people don't have that problem but you should realize that I don't have a team or that I have friends that play this game on console. This means I have to play with strangers and a lot of times these strangers aren't very friendly or fun to play games with. What makes ranked Overwatch players so toxic? Well it's probably the whole if you lose you lose rank points and so you're further away from ranking up. When something goes wrong it's somehow always the fault of someone else and some people aren't afraid to let you know. But somehow hardly anyone actuall...

Last week my computer was broken, just out of nowhere my harddrive just broke down. It was most likely because of old age because after six years computers are usually not that dependable anymore. So I had to deal with several with no use of my computer, which means no new videos I could upload on my YouTube channel and no blog posts here. It seems silly when you think of it but in fact I have grown a bit dependant of my computer and losing that, even for just a few days, means that I can't do certain things which is really weird and a bit lame. But can you live your life without computers and internet? Life is easier with computers and internet? That depends who you ask, because some older people are quite comfortable without computers and internet. For example my father hates it and refuses to get familiar with it. But that also means that the moment he needs to do something online, for example for taxes or other things related to that, then that means I have to do that for...

Getting achievements/trophies in a game can sometimes already be tough enough but with some effort and also some luck you can usually get most achievements/trophies in a game. But then there are multiplayer achievements/trophies, these don't always looks difficult but sometimes they are very difficult to get. What makes multiplayer achievements/trophies so difficult to get? My main issue with these achievements/trophies is that it takes other people to get them, so I need someone else to do something or be in a certain situation and then I have to take the benefit from that by doing what I need to do for the achievement/trophy. That's a complicated way of saying that I need someone to do something, but the problem is that other people often don't want you to get that achievement/trophy or they want to get the achievement?trophy and are want you to do whatever it takes to get that achievement/trophy. So it's pretty much an online struggle between people where they al...

It's that time of the year again so here come the events in games to remind us all of that! Overwatch has the Winter Wonderland event that pretty much involves a big snowball fight and you get of course several new skins and other customizable stuff from special loot boxes. But in my opinion this event is a bit of a disappointment, mostly because the customizable items aren't that special and there's also not a lot of them. Winter Wonderland event is a disappointment? Let me first say that I don't think it's bad, I just expected more from Blizzard especially when I look at the Halloween event in Overwatch. That was so much better and gave you a lot more stuff, you also had a fun but still challenging PvE game mode. In Winter Wonderland you only have this snowball fight and as much fun that can be for some time you get tired of this sooner or later. What's worse is that there is only one playable character, Mei. I wish that they had a PvE game mode and gave y...

Some games just aren't serious and the developers don't expect you to take the game serious, but that doesn't mean it's a bad game. Unlike some movies, you know the parody movie, certain games are actually more fun because they're not so serious. Does that mean that serious games are bad? No, but it does mean we don't need only one type of game but all kinds of games! Why so serious? The Joker already said it in the Dark Knight, why so serious? Isn't it more fun to just have fun? This is something that the developers of Saints Row understand and went from GTA wannabe to some ridiculous and absolutely hilarious game. I'm not saying that Saints Row and Saints Row 2 are bad, but in my opinion the games got a lot better with Saints Row the Third and Saints Row IV. Not just because it gives you more freedom, also all the ridiculous things you can do are absolutely fun to play. If you prefer a more serious game then you can always jump back to GTA, not tha...

It took so long but finally we got a sequel to the Indiana Jones trilogy and what's even better is that it's with some of the original actors. That's great but a bit late though, because everyone looks eh old. Which isn't terrible but it doesn't really fit with the Indiana Jones we know and love from the movie trilogy. But that didn't even bother me that much, no it was the introduction of his successor that really bothered me. Indiana Jones junior? There was actually a tv show about the younger years of Indiana Jones junior, it was called Young Indiana Jones. I actually liked that one and it gave you something instead of a new Indiana Jones movie. But now we finally have a new Indiana Jones movie and they introduce this character that is the son of Indiana Jones. Not that I want to say that the actor is terrible but it just felt so weird seeing this guy show up and oh yeah he's the son of Indiana Jones. That just doesn't make sense at all, ok in a w...

Some games let you roam around, you can do whatever you want but to get certain items or if you just want to see if you're lucky with a good item drop then you often have to farm. Farming in games means killing enemies over and over again and hoping that someone drops something you need and/or want. This doesn't seem like a bad thing and then you spend hours on it and still haven't gotten what you are looking for, then you know that farming isn't just lame but that it's very frustrating as well! What makes farming so frustrating? The fact that you have no guarantees, for example you can kill enemies for hours and not get one good item out of it. Which means you've been wasting hours on something that didn't get you anything, which isn't just boring but also a complete waste of time. Some people might say this about games anyway but farming is really the worst when it comes to certain games because you can really just play the game for hours and not g...

These days I don't have high expectations for games because I know that will often lead to disappointment, eventhough there are some exceptions. The trick of not being disappointed is not to have high expectations, because the higher your expectations are the bigger the chance is that you'll be disappointed. But that doesn't mean that it's not a bad thing when a game you bought isn't that much fun to play. Can you avoid that and how do you deal with this disappointment? How do you deal with disappointment? It helps not to have high expectations for a game but even then it can turn out to be a bad experience for you, especially games that made you wait a long time. I think a lot of Duke Nukem fans remember Duke Nukem Forever, a game that took a long time to finally launch and when it did not everyone was happy with it. I guess if you have to wait a long time things can change a lot, something you were hoping for at first might not be what you want when the game f...

I was playing a game yesterday and something really bad happened, something that made me sad and just left me with a negative feeling that just wouldn't go away. I won't tell you which game it is, because of spoilers, but I will describe what happened. My character lost the girl he loves and one of his best friends got badly wounded, which means my character and in a way me has to live with the guilt that you couldn't save the girl and your friend is now less effective in battle because he is badly wounded. There isn't a potion that will fix this or make it go away, the game pretty much shoves this in your face and lets you deal with it. Pretty brutal but in a way quite interesting, because we all know the happy moments from games but what about the sad moments? Why do some games make you depressed? Because some games make you go through some bad things. For example Lost Odyssey is a game where there is a super sad moment where the main character sees his daughter a...

I can hear the complaints already, another zombie game how lame! But if you actually played Dead Rising games then you know that these aren't typical zombie games, these are some hilarious and at times even ridiculous zombie games that are also a lot of fun to play! Is Dead Rising 4 also fun to play? Well let's find out! Frank is back? That's right, Frank West is back and kicking ass while looking good. He really goes for the ridiculous moments with his camera when he makes a selfie with him and a zombie or a lot of zombies. But this just shows how funny and relaxed this game is, because if you expect a serious survival horror experience then you've come to the wrong game! In Dead Rising 4, just like the previous Dead Rising games, it's not so much about the story but more about staying alive and getting a lot of kills. But it's important that you do complete story missions within the time limit or it will lead to a different ending that isn't the true e...

I think it's safe to say that most people that bought Final Fantasy XV love playing the game. Why? Because it's a fun open world game that let's you do all kinds of things and it's all so smooth and fast. But does that make the game perfect? No, because no game is perfect and Final Fantasy XV definitely has some issues. I'm not trying to whine about things but just mention things that bother me and I think that should've been different. Enemies out of nowhere. This is really frustrating when you're in a difficult battle, you're just barely getting the upper hand and then out of nowhere a new group of enemies suddenly joins the fight making it almost impossible to win. If this happens once or twice then that sucks, but when this happens ten or twenty times on one day then you get sick and tired of it! It's great that you can pick your own fights but sometimes you seem to be forced in more fights, which is frustrating and also annoying. What often ...

Ace Ventura pet detective was one of those movies I didn't know much about as a kid but decided to see anyway. I was already familiar with Jim Carrey with the silly movie Once Bitten and the hilarious movie the Mask. So Ace Ventura had to be good as well, right? Right! This is the most absurd movie? Well maybe not the most absurd but there are some moments that really made me laugh a lot. For example who can forget the assholemio song, it's when Ace is holding his butt cheeks and pretends to be talking and singing with them to a cop. That should immediately give you an idea what kind of humour you can expect, but even if it's a bit immature it's still hilarious! The story is also kind of silly because a dolphin is stolen and Ace has to find the dolphin, but who would steal a dolphin? Well I can't tell you that without spoiling the movie but it is quite the reveal! The ridiculous methods of Ace and of course Jim Carrey who is on fire the entire movie, well not li...

This is something not everyone would admit and I understand why because it's a bit embarrassing. But is it really so bad to be attracted to a character from a game? I mean it just means you appreciate how someone looks and it also pretty much proves that everything seems to be working on your end. Because if you wouldn't be attracted to someone that you think looks good now that would be strange, at least that's what I think! Fictional men or women are attractive too? When you watch a movie and you're attracted to a certain actor or actress then that's not odd, but when you're attracted to a character from a cartoon or game then it's suddenly weird. But is that really weird? I think not, because it's still about attraction and if you like the way someone looks then it's only natural that you're attracted to this person. Even if this person isn't real then that doesn't mean that your feelings aren't real, because those can be very ...

Final Fantasy XV was announced about a decade ago, I already loved the way it looked and I was really hoping to play it as soon as possible. That I had to wait a decade was unfortunate but it was worth the wait because Final Fantasy XV is amazing! How amazing? Well let's find out! Friends till the end? Already at the start of the game you get a pretty strong feeling what is going to matter in this game and friendship is probably the most important thing of everything. Noctis (you play as him) and his three friends, Gladiolus, Prompto and Ignis, are going to need eachother to make it out alive and will be in for some challenges. Wether that's beating a big monster or deciding who should drive the car. The thing is that this friendship will play a big part in the game. It didn't surprise me that at the beginning of the game  when they have to push the car that you hear the song stand by me, which pretty much confirms what I already thought and that is that friendship is g...

Just like every other job a YouTuber would like to take a break every now and then, because you're often busy with your job every day so it's nice if you can take a break for some time. But since being a YouTuber isn't your ordinary job then it also means that taking a break might be a bit less logic for this job. Because if you don't post videos you will often not get a lot of new viewers, unless people really love your old videos and keep watching those. So the question is... Can you take a break? In my opinion you can take a break, because if you commit 24/7 to YouTube you're just driving yourself crazy and you have to deal with a lot of stress. This doesn't make you happy and it's also not a smart way to live your life. So take a break every now and then, go out and do other things because if you spend every day in your house recording and uploading videos then that will become torture sooner or later. Some people just take a short break, sometimes...

It seems like more and more games have mini games inside the game, so if you get bored of doing missions or roaming around then you can just take a seat and play these mini games. The problem is that some of these mini games are very addictive, up to the point where you don't even continue with the story but just keep playing the mini game. Has that ever happened to you? Well it's not a big problem but it does keep you from making any progress in the game. What makes mini games so much fun? It can be something really simple, for example being addicted to succes. As long as you keep winning the mini game you want to keep playing it. I have this a lot with Gwent lately in the Witcher 3, I got pretty good at it and now I just go from place to place looking for other Gwent players. The fact that I haven't played any story missions for a couple of days isn't even bothering me at this moment. But other mini games like Blitzball in Final Fantasy X and Triple Triad in Final...

Have you ever played a game that you had to complete? Not just completing all quests or missions but also find all the collectibles, win all the mini games and pretty much do everything that you can do in that game. It's extreme but when you really love playing a game then why would you want to stop playing it? Oh right there are other games you also want to play... Can't stop, won't stop? Sometimes certain games can be very addictive, not just because you're having fun but also because you just don't want to stop playing. It's difficult to say farewell to certain games because somehow you know that once you stop playing you might never play that game again. Maybe never isn't the right word, but you probably won't play it again any time soon. So that leaves you with a difficult decision, are you going to keep playing it until you're completely done with the game or stop playing and maybe pick the game up later? It seems simple to just quit for no...

You probably heard D.VA say this several times in Overwatch, but is it really such a bad thing to play on easy mode? Is that something you should hide and be ashamed for because other people would think less of you? I don't think so! Playing on easy mode isn't a bad thing? Actually it's a good thing and even a smart thing to do. What better way to learn a game on the easiest difficulty, when you're in a hurry you can play faster through a game and it's a good way to get achievements/trophies as well because a lot of achievements/trophies will require you to do certain things that are often more difficult to do on a higher difficulty. Which is exaclty why easy mode is the best mode to get achievements/trophies. Sure you won't impress anyone with that and there will be no bragging rights, but does that really matter? I personally don't see the worth in that, because who cares that someone beat the game on the highest difficulty? I beat several games on the...

Before the whole super hero theme in movies started you had Gladiator, pretty much a (super) hero from ancient times and a movie that just blows you away! Already in the opening scene you see the might of the Romans and of the hero of the movie, Maximus, which is quite impressive. That alone already made me want to watch the movie several times because it's an amazing battle. It was the first time I saw this type of movie in the cinema and it left a big impression on me. What's so special about this movie? At first you might think it's just another revenge movie. A guy gets wronged and this guy goes through tough times to get his revenge, it seems nothing special but if you really watch the movie and see what it is all about then you know that just calling this a revenge movie is dumb. The movie is about honor, friendship, keeping a promise and of course family. The majority of the movie takes place in Rome, in the arena to be exact and that's not a bad thing. It gi...